Teens still skip breakfast

By MATTHEW TORBIT

Breakfast is becoming more popular but teenagers are still going without, with girls in their late teens most likely to skip the meal, a survey has shown.

A Nielsen Media Research survey released by Heinz Wattie's shows daily breakfast eating across all age groups is up from last year. But the survey registers an anomaly among 10 to 12-year-old boys, with 65 per cent of boys in this age group likely to eat breakfast, down from 77 per cent last year.

Nearly half of all younger teenage girls, aged 13 and 14, eat breakfast daily, but this drops off as they age - a major concern for nutritionists. Only one in three girls aged between 15 and 19, compared to 60 per cent of boys in the same bracket, ate breakfast every day.

Health and sports dietician Jeni Pearce, of the Nutrition Foundation, said that despite the figures improving from last year, it was a huge concern.

"Some of it will be due to image issues and some of it will be that they don't feel like it. Some teenage girls have got to the stage where they have conditioned themselves out of eating properly," Ms Pearce said.

"We really need to get more of those girls having breakfast."

The survey also indicates adults are not good role models for younger people. While eighty-five per cent of New Zealanders aged 75 and over have breakfast every morning, just 60 per cent of adults in their 40s eat breakfast daily. Ms Pearce said older people had more time and tended to be early risers.

"I'd be interested to see what the 10 to 12s will be doing when they get to this age. If we don't do anything then we could have a bit of a problem on our hands. Just because the figures are up it doesn't mean we can get complacent."

Breakfast was the most important meal of the day as it came after a 12-hour fast. "Your blood glucose levels will be low and the first thing breakfast does is replenish that fuel."

The message of eating properly needed to be pushed further.

"People should know why they need to eat breakfast and what makes up a good breakfast. Any breakfast is better than no breakfast."